Here is where it is important for you to choose the exFAT option from the menu.ħ. You will be asked for a Name, Format, and Scheme for your drive.

Go ahead and click Erase here if you are sure you would like to format the drive.Ħ. Clicking the Erase button will bring up a small window warning that you are about to erase all the data stored on the drive. Choose which drive you would like to format and click Erase in the top menu.ĥ. Here we have a Glyph 500GB drive shown under External options:Ĥ. The left menu will show you options for which drive you would like to format. Once you have Disk Utility open, click View -> Show All DevicesĤ. Open Launchpad -> click on Other -> Disk Utilityģ.

For newer drives this will usually be utilizing a USB type-C or Thunderbolt cable, but older drives might require a USB type-A connector.

Connect your hard drive to your Mac computer.

How to Format an External Drive Using MacOS Ventura We recommend using a separate drive specifically for Time Machine backups The Photos app will not let you save photo libraries on the same drive you use for Time Machine backups and you will get corrupted libraries. The reason for this is because formatting part of your drive to use for Time Machine will sometimes cause issues with other Mac apps like Photos. How To Format Your External Hard Drive for Mac or WindowsĪ few words word of caution before you set up your drive is to know that if you are planning to schedule Time Machine backups on your Mac, it is better to use a completely separate drive for that task.

How to format a mac disk on windows